


Happiness Does Not Wait

by lettertoelise



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: F/M, Friendship, Hurt/Comfort, Pre-Season/Series 05
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-08
Updated: 2018-07-08
Packaged: 2019-06-07 00:32:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 536
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15206873
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lettertoelise/pseuds/lettertoelise
Summary: He closes his eyes for a moment, his brow gathering in the middle.  It’s difficult to get Bellamy to talk about much more than just business these days.  He has a lot of opinions about water allocation, about which parts of the ship to renovate.  He talks about survival without talking about how they survived, but Clarke, she’s in every move he makes.  Raven knows - Bellamy doesn’t take a breathe without wishing Clarke were there to take it instead.





	Happiness Does Not Wait

**Author's Note:**

> This is just a small vignette I wrote a year ago as part of something larger. I figured I should do something with it :) Hope you enjoy!
> 
> Title from an Olafur Arnalds song.

It’s harder than anyone expects. At first. It’s the fatigue before Raven gets enough oxygen circulating, and then it’s hunger. Monty’s hands are slow to heal, he is all broken skin and broken smiles. Echo seems lost in this metal prison. She paces the halls with her fingers searching for softness, for warmth, but everything about this ship is cold. 

Raven spends her days patching together a crippled machine that keeps them alive. Breathing gets easier, the algae grows. She can see hope in Harper’s smile when Monty bends his fingers for the first time. She can hear it in Emori’s laughter, in the way she and Murphy whisper to one another and grin. Some days it’s almost like they’re living on more than a diet of survival instinct and adrenaline. 

Honestly, it’s only really Bellamy Raven worries about. He looks like the rest of them, a little thinner, a little older. He wakes and he works and he eats and he sleeps but in his eyes she can see the earth burning. And loss. He wears it like a shadow. 

“You going to leave any work for the rest of us?”

He looks up at the sound of her voice, neither surprised nor distracted, just a grimace hanging on his face as he turns back to the wires in his hands. “Not if I can help it.”

Raven sighs, but she’s used to the way he disregards her protests. It’s become a game they play - she crosses her arms and sighs, he ignores her. No one is keeping score.

“Have you eaten anything?” she asks, but the answer is always the same. Enough. Enough to last one more day among the stars and the sweat. 

When he tells her he’s fine, she pulls up the chair beside him, stretching out her knee, and he huffs. “Is this a nightly thing now?”

Raven just leans back. “I’ve got nothing better to do and Murphy keeps telling me we’ll die of boredom before anything else.” She stops him before he can roll his eyes. “So . . . Orpheus and Eurydice?” 

He closes his eyes for a moment, his brow gathering in the middle. It’s difficult to get Bellamy to talk about much more than just business these days. He has a lot of opinions about water allocation, about which parts of the ship to renovate. He talks about survival without talking about how they survived, but Clarke, she’s in every move he makes. Raven knows - Bellamy doesn’t take a breathe without wishing Clarke were there to take it instead. 

So she thinks about what Clarke would do and finds herself here, feet up on the desk, listening to Bellamy spin the tragedies. Eurydice, who tries to bring his wife back from the underworld but loses everything when he turns to see if she was behind him. 

“Would you have looked back?” she asks.

There’s a pause and Bellamy shakes his head, his hair falling in his eyes. “Orpheus had nothing to gain by looking back. Sometimes you just have to trust, Reyes.”

Raven smiles. Partly because he’s finally let the wires fall, his back resting against the wall, and partly because he’s smiling too. “Good thing I trust you.”


End file.
